the elements
by Bella Lumina
Summary: After an angry separation, Vaughn and Sydney's lives come crashing together again.
1. fire

**Title**: "the elements"  
**Chapter**: {fire}  
**Summary**: After an angry separation, Vaughn and Sydney's lives come crashing together again.  
**Category**: Sydney/Vaughn angst  
**Author**: Bella (bella@bellalumina.net)  
**Rating**: PG-13; future chapters will be R/NC-17  
**Timeline**: AU, takes place after "The Solution."  
**Thanks**: to Souris, for telling me this didn't suck. :)  
**Disclaimer**: _Alias_ is not mine.  
**Note**: Chapters will be posted weekly; the next update will be Monday, May 6.   
  
  
**{fire}**   
  
As a rule, Los Angeles gets no rain in the summer. The days are sticky-hot, with the oven-like glass buildings and sizzling sidewalks bringing an unbearable, oppressive heat to the city. Some take refuge at the beach, though even beside the promising blue water of the Pacific, the white sand is hot enough to blister the soles of bare feet. Others are even unluckier, forced to entomb themselves in the searing city, sweating through their crisply ironed dress shirts and freshly pressed business suits. Everything is burning and sweltering and overbearing, as if the sun itself is pushing down just on Los Angeles, evaporating every drop of moisture and setting everything on fire.   
  
It seems as if this Los Angeles July will be like any other. The air conditioner in the Land Rover picks the hottest day of the year so far to falter, so the back of Sydney's coolest blue dress shirt is soaked with sweat even before she arrives at Credit Dauphine. Feeling awkward and filthy as she parks in her usual spot, she grabs a hair tie from the never-used ashtray and pulls the damp, loose strands off her perspiration-slicked neck. She sighs, eager to get inside the building, to the stark offices that are always cold. She never thought she would be rushing to get inside this building.   
  
"Morning, Sydney," a fellow employee greets kindly. She smiles in return; George, a middle-aged accountant on the second floor, actually does work at the beard-bank sector of Credit Dauphine. The people on the other floors have no idea what happens on hers. "Surviving the weather?"   
  
"Marginally," she replies, smiling carefully. "How's Thelma?"   
  
"Good, good. She's home with Richie today; can you imagine having chicken pox in July?"   
  
She cringes, making a mental note to send something over for George's nine-year-old son. "I had them at his age, too. It was in February, though. Tell him I said hello?"   
  
"Of course. He'll appreciate it."   
  
"I'm glad. I'll see you later, George." She pushes the "up" button on the elevator. "Have a good day. Don't melt."   
  
"There's really no way to avoid that today, is there?" he asks jovially as she gets in to the elevator. The doors slide closed in front of her, and she presses the button for her floor, leaning back against the chilled metal walls in relief.   
  
It's an unconscious routine for her now. Through the white room, into the grim office, over to her desk: she doesn't even think about the mechanics of it all. The ramifications of it all, however, the reasons for her being there, never leave her mind. She's always completely conscious of her disgust for this place and her mission to end it. Today she's grateful for the coolness but still would rather that none of this ever existed, even if it meant that she had to sit in her car in traffic in July without air conditioning for an extra hour every morning.   
  
At ten o'clock, she sits through a second briefing meeting with Sloane, Dixon, and her father about the upcoming mission to New Zealand; at eleven, she visits Marshall for information on a new tracking device they want her to take to Auckland; at twelve-thirty, she breaks for lunch and leaves the blessed comfort of the familiar-yet-unnerving office. She goes to a local deli to pick up a sandwich and drives quickly to the park, trying to pick up a refreshing breeze through the open window. The park is deserted except for a brave group of grade school boys playing a game of makeshift baseball with a tennis ball and a cardboard packaging tube.   
  
She collapses onto a bench, trying to remember if she put on sunblock before she left the apartment that morning. Her skin isn't as young as it used to be; thirty-three years of California sun takes its toll on a pale complexion. She's certain that her usually-latent freckles will be popping out by mid-afternoon. A freckled spy. She'll look more like the girl on the old Wendy's signs than an international woman of mystery.   
  
He comes a few minutes later than they had planned; though that could just be time differences on their watches. His dark hair is slightly dampened with sweat; she figures hers must be, too. She smoothes the top of her ponytail and has to pull her hand away quickly: her hair, protesting the direct sun exposure, is almost as hot as the metal rivets in the bench. "Mind if I sit?"   
  
"No, go ahead," she acquiesces, moving her sandwich onto her lap and taking a bite. She swipes at a rivulet of mayonnaise that escapes onto her cheek. As she shifts to make herself more comfortable, the sheen of perspiration on her back slides against her shirt.   
  
"The New Zealand mission details haven't changed?" he asks, and she takes another bite of her sandwich.   
  
"No," she answers after she chews. She watches the kids launch the tennis ball at one another, laughing loudly through their heat-fogged haze. The switch has been helpful in one extent: she doesn't have trouble not looking at her handler anymore. "Everything is still as planned."   
  
He swipes at a bead of sweat that is rolling down his forehead. "Good. We want you to do a brush pass with the CD at the airport. I'll be the CIA contact; it will be the standard routine."   
  
One of the boys sits down in the grass, breathing heavily from heat and exertion. She squints as the sun continues to press sharply down on the thirsty park. "My father will give you the flight numbers."   
  
"We'll see you then," he says peremptorily and rises to leave.   
  
She wants to ask him about office gossip; she knows that he's a friend of Vaughn's, and even if Vaughn wouldn't volunteer information about his feelings, others might have stumbled on a tidbit. She thirsts for something, anything. Her entire being feels as parched as the crumbling, brown grass beside the bench.   
  
"Goodbye," she says quickly, continuing to eat her sandwich. She does not watch him walk away but instead keeps her eyes on the baseball kids, watching them each tire, dropping to the grass in a neat succession of fatigue.   
  
She finishes her sandwich quickly and walks back to her car; the drive back to Credit Dauphine is quick and mechanical. She's in meetings for the rest of the day. She leaves for Auckland in two days, and she still has to write a paper on the themes of _A Winter's Tale_. Who ever dreamed that she would still be in graduate school at thirty-three? Not her. By thirty-three she should have been out of this business altogether, happily teaching undergrads about the delights of Edith Hamilton's _Mythology_ or Henry Vaughan's poems. Instead she's still pounding the scorching pavement for SD-6, cursing herself for being stupid enough to get involved in the first place. For being stupid enough not to recognize when good things were put in front of her.   
  
On the way home at six, she mulls over her latest introspective theory. Say, perhaps, she has some character flaw, inherited from her mother, that makes her predisposed to make bad choices. It makes sense to her that genetics could be to blame for at least some of her faults. She has isolated so many personal blemishes that it would be a blessing to be able to foist at least some of them off on someone else. By the time she pulls the Land Rover into the driveway, however, she's decided that she should really stop the introspectives completely. Nothing's going to change her life now.   
  
Francie is making mai tais, and they settle down on the couch in front of the television to watch home improvement shows and drink themselves into a stupor. Francie has no idea what's been bothering Sydney, but she has hinted that she thinks it's about someone at work. Sydney hasn't denied or agreed with the suggestion.   
  
"Sydney, I think we're going to end up like those old women with a hundred cats," Francie slurs after her fourth drink.   
  
Sydney shakes her head, putting her drink down on the coffee table. "You'll get married."   
  
"What about you? I think we'll end up in this apartment with a hundred cats."   
  
"You're allergic to cats, Francie."   
  
"We could get ferrets," Francie offers, standing on wobbly legs. "I really want a margarita. Do we have anymore mix in the freezer?"   
  
Sydney considers this. "I think I finished it last Friday."   
  
"Without me?"   
  
"You had a date," Sydney points out.   
  
"It wasn't a date," Francie counters. "It was a job interview."   
  
"Whatever it was, I'm pretty sure I finished the margaritas."   
  
"You really think that we won't end up being old cat ladies?"   
  
She shrugs, lying down on the couch, face pressed into the cushions. "I hope not," she replies, her voice muffled.   
  
She falls asleep in the same position and wakes there the next morning with a pounding headache. "No more mai tais, Fran," she mutters as she trudges toward the bathroom.   
  
"You have a low mai tai tolerance," Francie grumps, pouring out a bowl of cereal.   
  
"Yeah," she agrees, wandering into the bathroom and splashing her face with cold water. She looks at her reflection in the mirror and makes a face. Her skin is splotchy, her nose is sunburned, and there are dark blue circles under her eyes. It's going to be a great day already, she can tell.   
  
The heat has not abated, and the wind has picked up, blowing dry, hot air across everything in the city. She muses that it sort of feels like a permanent blow dryer attacking her on high speed. Her journey to work is the same as yesterday, the same as every day. There is a comfort in routines. She's become so numb inside that she feels like a machine.   
  
She arrives at the office, greets George, and steps into the elevator. White room, stark office, familiar desk. She finishes the Auckland preliminary reports before nine o'clock and considers walking to the bodega down the street to look for strawberries. After a few moments of deliberation, she grabs her purse and heads outside.   
  
And that's when she sees him for the first time in three long months.   
  
He's walking in the opposite direction and passes her on the sidewalk. She feels her mouth open slightly and has to grasp a street sign post to keep herself from turning and running after him. He gives her a piercing "don't look at me...don't talk to me...fuck you, Bristow" look as he walks by, leaving her feeling stung and empty. She can feel her cheeks burning, and she ducks into a humid, shaded alleyway, taking deep breaths and willing herself not to cry. The hot wind scratches across her dry cheeks, making it even harder to swallow through her already painfully scratchy throat. She scrubs her face with her suddenly clammy fingertips, then walks back into the blinding sunlight and heads back to work.   
  
The office is nearly deserted except for herself, Dixon, Marshall, and Sloane; almost every other employer has the day off, and her father is on assignment. It's the Fourth, and she didn't even realize it until she got to work that morning and looked at her palm pilot. Her days have started to bleed together, saturated with anger and contempt, hollowed with loneliness and emptiness, glaring with the fact that her life is nothing like she thought it would be. The glimmer of hope that was always just close enough to brush has faded and died in the summer heat, and she's resigned herself to the fact that it won't be revived. She continues to work and live like an automaton, and somehow that's enough. She meets with Weiss, smiles at Sloane, chats with Francie, and aches inside.   
  
Marshall comes out of his office at four o'clock, bouncing around like a child at the prospect of fireworks later in the evening. He holds out the prototype for a new communication device, and she gingerly takes the faux-sapphire drop earring from his slightly trembling fingers, examining it thoroughly. "This is great, Marshall," she compliments, letting a measured smile perk at the corners of her mouth. "You've outdone yourself."   
  
He flushes at the compliment. "Thank you, I--"   
  
The cool of the office suddenly snaps. The door is wrenched open, and a sudden flood of men streams into the room, dressed in black, all wielding the kind of weapon that she knows how to fire but hates to even touch. A sudden shot from the direction of Sloane's office startles one of them, and then a rain of bullets ring out, the only rain she's seen in weeks. She hears herself emit a sound that's not a scream, not a gasp; she hits the floor, still clutching the earring, completely overwhelmed.   
  
Shoes slam against the concrete floor. Weapons fire, their bullets shattering glass and puncturing metal. Voices shout: she isolates the gruff sound of orders from agents as they sweep through the room. And then SD-6 security arrives, and the entire floor is plunged into chaos and darkness.   
  
And then silence.   
  
The floor is cool beneath her cheek, chilled by the air conditioner and dampened by the tears of surprise that have leaked from her eyes. She does not move; she feels paralyzed, though she's certain that she's untouched by the incident. Her mind races. This couldn't be the CIA; they hadn't told her. This could be the CIA, and she is going to have a serious conversation with Devlin if she gets out of here because he didn't tell her. She closes her eyes, and jerks when she feels the scuffle of light footsteps beside her head and the trail of careful fingertips on her arm.   
  
"Get up, Agent Bristow."   
  
She opens her eyes slowly and turns to look at him; it's him, no question. She couldn't mistake his voice. He wears the same black mask that all of the agents are wearing, but his eyes are distinct behind the barrier.   
  
"Vaughn--"   
  
He shakes his head. "Don't say anything, just get up and follow me. You're okay?" he replies, his voice flat, cold, and business-like, not full of the fire and brimstone she expected or the low, seductive warmth it held last time she heard him speak.   
  
She wants to cry. "I'm fine."   
  
"Then, just..."   
  
He stops and looks around warily. She follows his gaze, searching the room. He shakes his head, rubbing his eyes through the mask.   
  
"...just get up, and--"   
  
A shot, and then another, and he falls heavily against her.   
  
She gasps loudly, moving in a frenzy, pulling off the mask, frantically searching his body. She pulls him under her desk, rips open his jacket and shirt, feels his sticky-hot blood coat her fingers. And then she finds it; the entry is in his chest, just above his heart, gushing. He isn't wearing a bulletproof vest, and she resists the urge to scream and berate him: _What the hell were you thinking?_ His eyes flutter, and his hands move restlessly, and he says, softly, "Syd...?"   
  
She pushes her hand up against the wound, then cranes her head out from under the desk. "Help me! Somebody, help me!"   
  
The rest is a blur. Her father appears out of nowhere and helps her draw Vaughn out from under the desk. Suddenly Weiss is there, pulling off his mask and swearing loudly, and she's still pressing her hand against his chest, and then they're driving in her father's car, and she's in the back seat pushing carefully against his wound and wiping beads of sweat from his forehead and crying, an ugly, snotty cry that she can't hold in. He's drifting in and out and away and back, and she's trying to understand the gibberish word-sounds that fall incoherently from his lips. His glassy eyes find hers and lock on them, searching them carefully, and they're not angry or betrayed as they were on the street that morning. Instead they're vulnerable and tired, the gray-green color dulled from its normal piercing hue. She hears her name breathlessly torn from his lips, wipes the beads of sweat, and holds him tightly.   
  
  
Posted: Monday, April 29, 2002   
Next week: **{ice}**


	2. ice

**Title**: "the elements"  
**Chapter**: {ice}  
**Summary**: After an angry separation, Vaughn and Sydney's lives come crashing together again.  
**Category**: Sydney/Vaughn angst  
**Author**: Bella (bella@bellalumina.net)  
**Rating**: PG-13; future chapters will be R/NC-17  
**Timeline**: AU, takes place after "The Solution."  
**Thanks**: to Souris for the beta-read, and to the reviewers for their kind words.  
**Disclaimer**: Alias is not mine.  
**Note**: Chapters will be posted weekly; the next update will be Monday, May 13.   
  
  
**{ice}**   
  
The next thing she remembers is waking up in a thinly-padded waiting room chair, clutching at the arm rests for dear life. The room is painted winter-white, the antiseptic color that seems to be universal to hospitals. Tile floors, mundane office furniture, muted floral paintings: the impersonal, sterile, faux-soothing hallmarks of hospital décor are not missing in this waiting room. She thinks that the air conditioner must be on full-blast, because she's shivering lightly. Her father is standing in a corner, talking to Devlin in a low voice. Weiss is pacing; he notices that she's awake, and he walks over to sit beside her. "Welcome back," he says gently, patting her arm awkwardly with a cool hand.   
  
"Is he...?"   
  
"Alive? Yes," Weiss says carefully.   
  
"Surgery?"   
  
"For the last five hours, so far."   
  
"What do you know?" she asks, coughing and bringing her knees up to her chest.   
  
He clears his throat and speaks quietly. "The bullet shredded a major artery. They've given him a ton of blood already."   
  
She rests her forehead on her knees. "He didn't have a vest on."   
  
Weiss shakes his head. "I have no clue why he didn't." He pauses, frowning at her. "Syd, we really shouldn't even have let you come here."   
  
Her eyes are red-rimmed and angry as she turns to him. "Why not?"   
  
"You know why. We took down the headquarters, Syd, but that doesn't mean that someone else isn't watching."   
  
"I don't care," she replies icily. "You should know that. I have to be here."   
  
He presses his lips into a thin line. "Your father's going to take you home."   
  
"I'm staying here."   
  
"No, Sydney, you're not. You can't do anything for him now. You need to go home and get some sleep. You're exhausted."   
  
"I'm fine."   
  
"You passed out as soon as we got him inside. A doctor checked you out. You've not been taking care of yourself very well, have you?" he asks, his voice even and certain.   
  
"I'm fine, Weiss," she says firmly, swiping at her face, finally realizing that her fingers are still caked with his blood; she can fix that, she thinks, hungering for a faucet full of stinging cold water and some cheap pink liquid soap. Her shirt has a huge brown-red streak marring one side, and her pants are stained as well, but she figures those stains probably won't wash out at all. "I just need to wash my hands."   
  
She stands on wobbly legs and hunts for a bathroom, finally finding one nearby and slipping inside. She avoids looking in the mirror as she scrubs the blood off of her hands. Her head is pounding, and she leans it forward to rest against the cool of the mirror. Inside the sterile, placid, frigid environment of the hospital, her insides feel completely different from their earlier state; as they were in turmoil, hot and angry and unsettled, they are now resigned, frozen, paralyzed, and cold. They know she won't leave him. She wonders why they even bother trying to convince her to go.   
  
Three hours later, he's still in surgery; an hour after that, a balding surgeon garbed in bloodstained green scrubs walks wearily into the waiting room and gives them a weak smile. "He made it through," he intones quietly, and she sighs, leaning against her father's arm, which is as unyielding as ever.   
  
The doctor sits down in a chair nearby, focusing on Sydney. "You're the spouse?" he asks.   
  
She feels her cheeks redden, her hands cold as she clutches the armrest of the chair. "What? No ... no. No, I'm just a friend." She inhales shakily, trying to ignore Weiss's inquisitive stare. "Just a friend."   
  
"Any relatives here at all?"   
  
Devlin shakes his head. "His mother is out of the country. He doesn't have any other relatives in the States."   
  
The doctor sighs. "Okay. Okay. Are you all friends of Mr. Vaughn's, then?"   
  
"I've known the family for years," Devlin explains quietly, and Sydney feels her eyebrows raise in surprise. She knows that Devlin has given Vaughn second and third chances more than once, but she had no idea it was because he was a friend. Had he known Vaughn's father? She decides that it's possible. "I can take care of anything."   
  
"Is there any way to contact his mother?"   
  
Devlin frowns. "Not at this time of year. Her husband died in July, and now she goes to France for the summer every year. She makes sure that she can't be contacted."   
  
The surgeon sighs, and she shivers involuntarily. "It's still touch and go, and it would be helpful to have a family member around...."   
  
_To make difficult decisions_, she finishes mentally, burying her head in her knees.   
  
Devlin sighs. "I can take care of anything," he repeats.   
  
The doctor nods, standing, his shoes squeaking a little against the pristine white floor. She wants to say something; it's on the tip of her tongue, but she can't quite articulate it. It spills from her lips as he turns to leave. "When can we see him?"   
  
He looks up, surprised at her blurted words, and frowns. "A family member could see him in a few hours, but you're not a relative, so hours are completely off-limits at this point."   
  
She swears her blood freezes in her veins. "Then none of us will be able to see him," she argues tightly.   
  
The doctor shrugs. "It's policy. I'm sorry."   
  
"You can't do that!" she exclaims, rising from her chair; her father and Weiss both grab her arms and pull her back to her chair.   
  
"We'll work on it," Weiss hisses, and she relaxes slightly.   
  
A few hours later she's still curled up in the chair; Weiss hands her a can of soda, still chilled from the machine, and her fingers rebel against the icy temperature. She sets it down on a table beside her. "Anything...?"   
  
"Your father's taking care of it. You'll be able to go in." He pops the top on his own soda and sits beside her. "He doesn't like Vaughn. He's been gritting his teeth the whole time."   
  
"He's my father," she shrugs. "I can't believe this is happening."   
  
"I talked to some of the other agents involved in the take-down," Weiss says, taking a long sip of his cola. "Sloane's in custody. SD-6 is gone, Sydney."   
  
She shivers slightly at the words, sinking deeper into her chair. "Why did he come to the building, Weiss? No, don't look at me like that ... listen, he didn't have to come. He shouldn't have come."   
  
"Don't you think you know why he wanted to be there?" he asked lightly, taking a drink and not looking at her.   
  
She stops fidgeting. "What do you know?"   
  
He gives her a look that warns her to shut up. "I know things that could get both of you in trouble," he says quickly, standing and tossing the smooth aluminum can into a trash receptacle before walking away.   
  
Laying her head back against the wall, she exhales, deciding that of all the thousand scenarios she imagined for the end of SD-6, this wasn't ever one of them. She imagined a breezy, pleasant spring day when she would walk proudly out of Credit Dauphine, head held high, ready to move on with her life, ready to face her feelings for the man in her life. Never once did she think that she would end up crying miserably in a freezing cold hospital waiting room, smeared with blood, uncertain that said man would allow her into his hospital room even if the hospital staff assented.   
  
"Come on," her father says tonelessly, shaking her shoulder roughly. She's not sure how long she's been sitting there. She knows he's probably disgusted with her and her behavior. Her father is a graduate of the Stiff Upper Lip Society of the '50s and '60s, and he frowns upon unnecessary emotions. His posture alone when he sees someone crying is an indicator that he's completely uncomfortable with any emotional display. She remembers skinning her knee on a bitingly cold day in January when she was seven -- a year after her mother's purported death -- and watching her father look on while Rosa soothed and swabbed and bandaged. The look on her face then made her certain that her father didn't love her; he was closed-off, uncertain, not quite helpless, but uncomfortable; he didn't want to be there, and that was devastating to her seven-year-old-self. "Come on," he orders again. "You can go see him if you want."   
  
She looks up, willing herself to "pull it together" and "be strong," two of her father's favorite commands in any emotional situation. She nods, unfolding her arms and legs and mutely following him down the icebox-like hallway. They traipse through two corridors before coming up to a set of doors with "Intensive Care," printed on them in bold white letters. Her father hangs back. "I'm not going in. The nurses will tell you where he is." She nods; she figured as much.   
  
The ICU is dead silent. She looks around, surveying the situation from all angles before proceeding. It's at that moment that she realizes that no matter how far removed she is from SD-6 and the CIA, she will always react and carry herself like a spy. Spy skills have been ingrained in her for so long that they're reflexes instead of conscious decisions. She approaches the circular nurses' station and asks a man with deep chocolate skin and a tag that reads "Alex" where she can find Michael Vaughn.   
  
He leads her to a door that is partly propped open and pushes it carefully. "You're the fiancee?" he asks, seeming genuinely interested.   
  
She's taken aback for a moment before she realizes that must be the cover story. "Yes," she says, trying to give him a wan smile. "I really appreciate this."   
  
"It's no problem," he says, smiling gently. "Hospital rules are made to be a little flexible. He's just still under the anesthetic, by the way; he's not in a coma. They'll probably bring him out of it in a few hours."   
  
She decides that she needs to have Alex explain his rule philosophy to Vaughn's surgeon. Smiling again, she thanks him softly and moves into the room, finally getting her first look at him.   
  
Her first thought is that she's never seen so much plastic in her life: plastic machines, plastic tubing, a plastic ventilator tube taped to his pale lips. Her second thought is that he's not in the bed in front of her; that's not him, it's a waxy, pale mannequin. The healthy, tanned, _alive_ Vaughn that she knows -- that she loves, whether he loves her back anymore or not -- is not there, and yet....   
  
She exhales softly, moving to a chair that sits just beside the bed, and just watches him for a long while. He breathes slowly; or, rather, one of the machines at his bedside breathes slowly for him. His eyes are closed, and she realizes with a small smile that, even in his current state, he's thinking about something: the ever-present lines still furrow across his otherwise smooth forehead. Finally she summons the nerve to touch him, and reaches out a single fingertip, smoothing it down his forearm and hand. His skin is soft and warm, not the cold, corpse-like skin she expected. Scooting the chair closer, she lays her head down beside his hand and gently weaves her fingers through his, feeling salty tears trickle down her cheeks and drip onto the bleach-roughened white sheets.   
  
And then, to her embarrassment, she falls asleep. She doesn't stir until Devlin's hand on her arm gently pulls her back to reality. "Sydney, you need to go back to the waiting room," he says, not harshly but.... She's not sure.   
  
Raising her head, she sees that the nurse -- Alex -- is in the room also, discreetly changing IV bags that dangle from a metal tree. He gives her a comforting look, and she stands, wiping furiously at her cheeks. "Something wrong?"   
  
"We've got someone here to take you back to the office. You need to finish a report for us."   
  
She watches Alex working busily in her peripheral vision. "Now?" Devlin nods, and she exhales. "Okay. But I'm coming right back...."   
  
He holds up his hands. "Can't stop you."   
  
"Okay," she says, taking a quick look back at Vaughn, who is still unmoving in the hospital bed. All the fluidity seems gone from him, frozen into a block of skin and bone and blood. She bites her lip and walks back to the waiting room.   
  
Weiss drives her to the CIA headquarters, and neither of them says a word on the drive. He pulls into the parking garage, then drives to his space; she tries not to look, but she sees Vaughn's car still occupying its spot nearby. Weiss takes her arm and steers her into the offices.   
  
"I don't understand why they wanted to do this _now_," she says edgily, though she knows exactly why they want to talk to her quickly, when everything's fresh in her mind.   
  
Weiss gives her a look, but doesn't say anything until they're on the elevator. "About what I said before...he told me, Sydney, what happened with the two of you. He was acting strange the night he had himself reassigned, and I figured it was you, so Driscoll and I took him out and got him drunk, and he told me when I drove him home."   
  
She can't hold her tongue. "What, so he told you that we slept together and then I screwed him over?" she replies in a low voice.   
  
His mouth drops open at her bluntness. "That's not...he didn't say exactly that."   
  
"I'll bet that was the gist of it," she murmurs, looking down at her shoes.   
  
"Isn't that what happened?" Weiss replies, not needling, but so shocked that it sounds as if he can't help asking.   
  
She lifts a shoulder delicately. "Depends on your perspective, I guess. I can see why he would think that."   
  
Weiss laughs, a short, harsh chuckle that was full of cynicism, not mirth. "How the hell do you change that around with perspective?"   
  
The elevator door opens and they stop talking.   
  
The hours she spends in the office plod by; she meets with Barnett, takes a lie detector test, talks with Davenport and other officers she's never seen before, and takes another tests. They videotape an interview -- she wonders briefly if it could be found someday like her mother's taped interview -- and tell her that she can go home. It's all cold, impersonal, and proper.   
  
She sneaks out of the office before Weiss can find her, hails a cab, and trudges back into the hospital.   
  
He's awake. She knows it before she even steps into the room. He is awake, and he's off the ventilator, breathing evenly on his own. His eyes light on her, wearily glance at her tired face and her blood-smeared clothes, and then close. He turns his head to the side, away from her, effectively shutting her out. She isn't deterred by the icy body language; he's often good at hiding emotion, but she's learned to decipher his feelings. It's when she hears his words -- a raspy, labored, whispered "go away" -- that she truly feels as if a bucket of cold water has been thrown on her. After everything ... after she bawled pathetically over him ... he's going to turn her away.   
  
She should have expected this. She picks up the jacket she'd brought back from the CIA offices and leaves.   
  
  
Posted: Monday, May 6, 2002   
Next week: **{earth}**


	3. earth

**Title**: "the elements"  
**Chapter**: {earth}  
**Summary**: After an angry separation, Vaughn and Sydney's lives come crashing together again.  
**Category**: Sydney/Vaughn angst  
**Author**: Bella (bella@bellalumina.net)  
**Rating**: PG-13; future chapters will be R/NC-17  
**Timeline**: AU, takes place after "The Solution."  
**Thanks**: to Souris for the beta-read, and to the reviewers for their kind words.  
**Disclaimer**: Alias is not mine.  
**Note**: Chapters will be posted weekly; the next update will be Monday, May 20.   
  
  
**{earth}**   
  
She decides that it's some sort of cosmic joke that she somehow manages to find the only mud to step into in the whole parched city. She lifts her shoe out of the ground and makes a face, staring at the caked sole. Her apartment seems a million miles away as she awkwardly hops up the walk with a muddy shoe carefully lifted off the pavement; she's already inside before she remembers what she looks like.   
  
"Oh, my God," Francie breathes, looking up from whatever she's cooking in the kitchen. Her mouth drops open, and she squeaks. "Oh, my God, Sydney...."   
  
"Hang on, I'm all muddy," she mutters, hanging onto the door frame for support as she pulls off the muddy shoe and drops it just outside the door.   
  
"Muddy? Oh, my God," she says again. "You're covered in blood! Where the hell have you been? Will's been looking all over the place...."   
  
"He shouldn't have done that," Sydney answers, her voice a little too sharp. She sighs, moving to sit on the couch. "Just ... don't ask me to tell you, okay? I can't...."   
  
Francie's crying, and that makes tears start running down Sydney's face, too. "Sydney...."   
  
"Stop it," she says futilely, hiccupping. She never knew how many tears she had stored up in her body. Her whole face hurts, and her throat is raw from crying, she's sure of it.   
  
Francie comes around to the front of the couch and sits beside her, pulling her into a maternal hug. "I'm so sorry," she says automatically, the kind of canned sympathy that would usually make Sydney a little uncomfortable and a lot angry. Tonight, though, she just rests her head on Francie's shoulder and lets the tears come.   
  
They sit there for a while, and then Sydney disentangles herself from the hug and stands, scrubbing her face with her open palms. "I need a shower."   
  
Francie nods. "I'm making dinner, if you're hungry."   
  
"I'm not."   
  
She nods again. "I figured you wouldn't be."   
  
"Yeah." She walks into the bathroom and stares at her reflection. Suddenly, she strips off the bloody clothing angrily, throwing it forcefully to the tile floor. Fuck Vaughn. Fuck the CIA. Fuck everyone. Maybe she should just get in her car and drive into the desert and stay there. She could try Will's suggestion from a long-ago drunken night that they should go digging through the desert sand to find the soil deep below. He'd figured at the time that they might get into the Guinness Book of World Records with that stunt. She thinks maybe it would be a good way to occupy her time now.   
  
If he doesn't need her, then she definitely doesn't need him. She thinks on this as she steps into the shower and turns on the faucet. The water dribbles down on her at first, then forms into a well-developed spray. She sighs, letting the shower of drops wipe away the earth and blood that she's accumulated. If the bastard doesn't need her help, she won't help him. She grabs the shampoo -- her stomach flips a little when she remembers how he loved the way her hair smelled -- and squirts a dollop of gel into her hand. If he doesn't love her, then she won't love him. It's as simple as that.   
  
Right.   
  
She showers quickly, changing into a tank top and a pair of well-worn flannel shorts with her college's logo emblazoned on one leg. Grabbing the comforter off her bed, she trudges out to the couch and constructs the kind of little cocoon she loved to make when she was small. She burrows inside, poking her head out and resting it on one of the couch pillows, and falls asleep.   
  
She dreams of him -- dreams of them together. They're in the desert, and it's as hot there as it was in the park on her last meeting with Weiss. He's got a shovel, bizarrely, and he's not digging through to find the earth, but he's planting flowers in a desert-oasis-garden that's already green and colorful with blooms and foliage. Azaleas, she thinks as she watches him turn over mounds of chocolate-colored soil, though Francie's the one with the green thumb, not her. He looks up at her, and she's a little embarrassed to have been caught staring at him. He smiles, though, an expression she hasn't seen from him in so long. Putting his shovel on the ground, he steps slowly toward her. And then her breath catches in her throat; and then his hands come up to her arms and slide down them slowly; and then he's kissing her deeply, and they're on the ground and he's pushing their clothes out of the way and they're making love again. The sand is somehow gone; the ground beneath her back feels smooth, not gritty or scratchy. His eyes are brilliantly green as he moves above her, watching her face carefully, and the slow, deliberate way he touches her makes her arch and laugh and smile. Just as she's right there, feeling so wonderful....   
  
"Sydney?"   
  
She opens her eyes lazily and sits up quickly. It's Will; she prays that she didn't say anything out loud. She knows that her cheeks are red. "Yeah?" she asks softly.   
  
His eyes are so full of concern that she just wants to sink back into her cocoon. She doesn't want his concern. She got out of the SD-6 mess just fine, no scratches. "Francie said you'd come home."   
  
"She called you?" she questions, closing her eyes. "She shouldn't have done that."   
  
He starts to say something, but she shakes her head, cutting him off. "I'm fine. You shouldn't have come over here, she shouldn't have called, you shouldn't have gone looking for me. I'm fine. Fine."   
  
She starts to burrow back under the covers, but he stops her with a firm hand on her shoulder. "Hey. Look at me."   
  
She won't, and he sighs, continuing, "You want us to pretend like we don't care about you? You know, sometimes we think that maybe you don't really care all that much for us, but that doesn't change the fact that we care for you."   
  
Francie appears out of nowhere. "Stop it, Will...."   
  
"No," he says stubbornly. "This is a long time in coming and you know it. I don't know what the hell your problem is, but if you don't want to see us anymore, you should tell us to go. We'll go."   
  
"Will...."   
  
"I'm _serious_, Francie," he interrupts angrily. "Sydney, we've lived with your shitty excuses and your broken promises long enough. Either you're straight with us, or we don't need to be friends anymore."   
  
She stares at him.   
  
Francie looks at the floor, then says something under her breath and turns to flee from the kitchen. "Wait," Will says, his voice calmer. "You need to hear this, too."   
  
Sydney shifts in her pile of blankets, the feeling of Vaughn's hands gripping her thighs playing over and over in her mind. "What exactly do you want me to say?"   
  
"I want to know ... we want to know what you've been up to," he says, meeting her eyes defiantly. "Stop lying to us right now."   
  
She stands, untangling herself from her blankets, and hugs herself protectively. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you the truth."   
  
And then, almost imperceptibly, Will's face changes. There's a look in his eyes that she's never seen before. "Try me," he says, and his voice is lower and suddenly older.   
  
She opens her mouth and then closes it, looking over at Francie, who's watching the scene with wide, startled eyes. "I work for the CIA," she says, and Will's body tenses completely. _He knows_, she thinks. He knows something, anyway. She continues. "I worked as a double agent infiltrating another agency until yesterday. The man that I worked with ... my CIA handler ... was shot during a raid on the rogue agency."   
  
Will's eyes are incredibly wide; she thinks she sees the wheels racing in his mind. Francie laughs. "Good one, Syd. Now tell us what really--"   
  
"--SD-6," Will says flatly.   
  
She looks at him. "Yes."   
  
Now Francie's watching both of them, her face both frightened and uncertain. "Wait...."   
  
"Francie, I'm a spy," she repeats clearly, softly.   
  
"No, you're not," Francie argues, grabbing the edge of a table to steady herself. "You work for a bank."   
  
"I don't work for a bank."   
  
"Yes, you do! You work for a bank. I've seen the building. I've put money in that bank."   
  
"I know. It's a front operation for the rogue agency, for SD-6," she says quietly. Her stomach is doing flip-flops.   
  
"This can't be happening," Francie says, her hands coming up to rub her face.   
  
"Your father said you weren't a part of this," Will states suddenly.   
  
She panics. "What?"   
  
"After Danny died, I investigated," he says.   
  
"I know that," she argues. "You stopped."   
  
He shakes his head. "You don't know how much I wish that I had." He stands and paces. "I found out about SD-6, and your father threatened me. He told me you knew nothing about it."   
  
"Will--"   
  
"--what, did you know that they were going to kill Danny?" he accuses suddenly and loudly, stepping into her personal space. "Did you help plan it?"   
  
"Stop it," she says angrily, covering her face with her hands.   
  
"So, did you screw over this other guy, too? He knew too much, so you and SD-6 had him targeted, too?" he presses, his eyes wild.   
  
A crack resounds through the room, and Francie gasps. Sydney watches as Will clutches his face, and she rubs her stinging palm.   
  
"Stop it," she says again, quieter, fleeing to her room. "Now do you know why I didn't tell you?" she calls over her shoulder before slamming the door.   
  
She puts on a pair of shoes and crawls out the window. Yes, she feels like a coward; she also doesn't care. Her actions all feel automatic, like she's in mission-mode: get in the car, turn the key, and pull onto the street. She doesn't realize she's driven to the hospital until she pulls into the parking lot. Her face falls into her open palms, and she feels like she can't breathe.   
  
He's the only one that knows what it was like. He's the only one who can understand why she's done the things she's done.   
  
That would have worked a few months ago, she muses, but not anymore. She betrayed their trust, and now she has to deal with it. The chance she had with him is gone; she's certain they can't even be friends anymore, let alone lovers, or whatever it is they were.   
  
She has to try. She opens the car door, takes a deep breath, and plants her feet on the dirty pavement. She has to try because no one else could possibly understand her at this moment. She has to try because, damn it, she still loves him, and she knows that if he can only forgive her, then maybe they have a chance.   
  
The hospital smells distinctly medical as she hurries through the doors and onto the elevator, praying that Alex is still there to let her into the room. He is, and he murmurs not to stay too long as he opens the door for her.   
  
He's awake. He looks at her, his eyes weary and confused and angry. A deep breath, then, "I thought I told you--"   
  
"--I heard you," she replies. "But I had to see you."   
  
"What could you possibly want?" he asks, his voice low and slightly perturbed.   
  
"I can't leave things this way with you."   
  
His hands move restlessly over the blankets. "You left things with me three months ago in Paris. Don't try to change that now."   
  
"That's not fair."   
  
"Life's not fair," he replies coolly. "Now get out."   
  
"No," she challenges. "You've got to listen to me."   
  
"I don't have to listen to you."   
  
"What, are you going to get up and leave?"   
  
His eyes are suddenly sharp and cutting. "That's low, Sydney."   
  
"Whatever you think," she says dismissively. She pauses, watching his heart monitor. "You had us all pretty scared, you know."   
  
"I'm fine," he says irritably.   
  
"You're better than yesterday," she acquiesces. "Vaughn, you almost bled to death in the back seat of my father's car."   
  
His brow furrows. "I remember it, Sydney."   
  
"I thought you were going to die," she says softly.   
  
"I thought I was going to die, too," he answers, his voice even and a little flippant.   
  
She wants to strangle him for acting so aloof. "SD-6 is gone."   
  
"Devlin told me."   
  
"I told Francie and Will," she offers. "They didn't take it well."   
  
"So you came here?" he asks. "Why the hell would you do that? I'm not going to try to make you feel better, Sydney. I played that part far too long. And after all those years of reassuring you, of worrying about you, you stepped on me. You absolutely betrayed me."   
  
"I know," she says shakily, looking down at her hands.   
  
"So why in the world are you here?"   
  
"I don't know."   
  
"I don't buy that." He coughs, suddenly, and she looks around quickly.   
  
"Should I get someone? Vaughn...?"   
  
He holds out a hand, wincing as the action disturbs an IV line. "I'm okay."   
  
"I needed to talk to you. I needed to talk to someone who understands me."   
  
"I'm not that person anymore."   
  
"You were the only one," she says, her eyes pleading with him. "There isn't anyone else who even came close to knowing what my life is like."   
  
"_Was_ like," he corrects. "You're free to do whatever you want now."   
  
"You know that's not true," she disagrees. "Nothing's ever going to be the same for me."   
  
"Well," he begins, "I suppose that's something you'll have to think about." He pauses. "I'm tired. You'd better go."   
  
She nods. "I'm ... I'm so sorry, Vaughn."   
  
He shakes his head. "Too late for that."   
  
"I am, anyway."   
  
He looks at her, and then turns his face away. She walks out of the door and starts to head toward the exit before changing her mind; she heads back to the waiting room instead. There's no one in the room except Devlin, and he simply nods at her over his copy of the _Times_ when she walks in. She nods in return, curls up in one of the chairs, and falls asleep.   
  
  
Posted: Monday, May 13, 2002   
Next week: **{wind}**


	4. wind

**Title**: "the elements"  
**Chapter**: {wind}  
**Summary**: After an angry separation, Vaughn and Sydney's lives come crashing together again.  
**Category**: Sydney/Vaughn angst  
**Author**: Bella (bella@bellalumina.net)  
**Rating**: PG-13; future chapters will be R/NC-17  
**Timeline**: AU, takes place after "The Solution."  
**Thanks**: to Souris for the encouragement, and to the reviewers for their kind words.  
**Disclaimer**: Alias is not mine.  
**Note**: Chapters will be posted weekly; the next update will be Monday, May 27.   
  
  
**{wind}**   
  
Three days sweep by in a blur, then four, and suddenly a few days turn into a week and a half. She has, in her structured way, set up a mental schedule so that she doesn't have to deal with the things she'd like to avoid. She leaves the house at six, half an hour before Francie awakens, and heads to the college library to work on a term paper. At nine, she takes a break for coffee and sits for an hour in a Starbucks close to the Credit Dauphine building, watching customers wipe the sweat off their foreheads as they trudge in and out of the bank building; she learned during her briefing a week or so before that the government was going to keep the banking operation open. She figures they want to cause as little ruckus as possible. 

After her coffee, she leaves to go home for a few hours, until an hour before Francie comes home from work. Will doesn't stop by anymore, and she's thankful for that. She doesn't know what she'll say to him the next time they meet. At two-thirty, she goes to the hospital and asks to see Vaughn; every day the nurse explains that he doesn't want any visitors. She sits in the waiting room with a book until visiting hours are over, and then she goes home and goes to sleep. 

Two weeks to the day Vaughn was shot, things change. A strange, blustery wind filters through the city, still hot, but less oppressive than the stagnant heat of early July. It rushes through downtown, picking up speed as it sprints through the narrow streets between the skyscrapers, angering pedestrians with briefcases and cellular phones. It knocks off hats and grabs newspapers out of unsuspecting hands; its whipping fury coasts into the suburbs and chaps the cheeks of neighborhood kids. 

Sydney is making her way out of the coffee shop when the wind hits her for the first time. It tugs at her shirt and jeans and urges her down the street to her car. She hops into the Land Rover and sits for a moment, looking down at the steering wheel, deep in thought. When she finally starts the car, she doesn't turn toward home but instead heads for the hospital. 

She moves toward Vaughn's room like the wind is pushing her there. He's been moved to a normal room on the fourth floor, so she doesn't see Alex any longer; she wishes he were there to let her in the room, because Vaughn's new nurse is a middle-aged woman who turns up her nose at Sydney's requests. 

Glancing around to make sure the nurse is nowhere in sight, Sydney stops outside the door marked "Vaughn, M." in hasty medical handwriting and stares, taking a deep breath. She closes her eyes, scrunches up her face, and knocks. 

"Come in," his voice calls indifferently. 

She opens the door and peers inside. "Vaughn?" 

He's out of bed, clad in a pair of khakis, struggling to slide on a clean, white button-down shirt. He sighs and turns his gaze toward her. "What are you doing here?" 

His tone doesn't faze her. "I wanted to see how you were doing. Are you going home?" 

"Hopefully. This afternoon, if everything works as planned," he says turning his attention back to the shirt. His torso is still heavily bandaged, and he winces as he lifts an arm. 

"Wait, let me help," she says, setting her bag down on the bed and hurrying over to him. 

"You don't need to do that," he states as she slides the sleeves of the shirt onto his arms. 

"You could have pulled a stitch," she observes, focusing on buttoning the shirt, not looking at his face. Her voice drops in volume as she continues, "Is Devlin driving you home?" 

He gives her a strange look. "No, I'm taking a cab. Why Devlin?" 

She shrugged, pushing the last opalescent button through its buttonhole. "He signed for your surgery." 

"I'm a little more coherent now. I can sign myself out," he points out, and she nods. 

"I know, I just thought...." She sighs. "I don't know what I thought." 

She finishes buttoning the shirt and backs away. "Thank you," he says softly. 

She nods. "No problem." 

They stand in awkward silence for a moment before she broaches, "Is Weiss going to stay with you?" 

He raises an eyebrow. "I'll be fine on my own." 

"Vaughn," she admonishes, "you can't even put on a shirt. You can't stay by yourself." 

"I'm fine," he repeats. 

She shakes her head. "This is going to be how it is between us now?" 

"How would you like it to be between us?" he asks in a measured voice, giving her a look that says he thinks she's crazy. 

"Civil?" she offers, gesturing vaguely, wrapping her arms protectively around herself. 

He smiles sarcastically, but it thrills her just to see his deep dimples and white teeth again. "You're serious," he says in a low voice. "This is civil, Sydney. This is as civil as it needs to get." 

"What exactly does that mean?" 

"Our ... _relationship_ ... it's over, Sydney. We don't work together anymore. That's all it was. Work," he says dismissively. 

"You make love to all of your coworkers?" she asks, unable to keep anger from edging into her voice. "Do you buy Christmas presents for all of them? Do you break the rules for them?" 

His eyes rage. "Are you trying to make me feel pathetic? Are you going to throw every little thing I--" 

"--I'm trying to say that we meant something to each other," she interrupts. "You meant something to me. I didn't mean anything to you?" 

"I _meant something_ to you?" he seethes. "That's rich." 

"Vaughn...." 

"No, no, wait. You sleep with every friend that you know you're going to walk out on? That you're going to steal from and lie to?" 

"It wasn't like that." 

"It was like that, and you know it. What do you want from me? I can't be the same Vaughn I was before, not to you. I don't just go around falling into bed with people. That's your problem, not mine." 

She has to count to ten to keep herself from screaming at him. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?" 

"Paris wasn't the first time you used me, Sydney. You slept with that assassin; you knew how I felt about you--" 

"--that's not fair. I had a history with Noah. He wasn't just an assassin." 

"I don't care if he was fucking _Gandhi_. You knew how I felt, I _thought_ I knew how you felt, but obviously I didn't, because you slept with him anyway. And I had to pretend that I couldn't tell you had feelings for someone else. I had to _comfort_ you," he says with disgust. 

He stops and sits, and only then does she notice how labored his breathing has become. 

"Vaughn, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have started this again." 

"This," he says, gesturing at the space between them, "is what we are now. This won't change." 

"You won't ever be able to forgive me for this," she says, not questioning but coming to terms. 

"I don't know. Sorry just doesn't seem like it's enough," he says quietly, avoiding her eyes. 

"I don't know what else I can offer you," she murmurs. 

He nods. "That's what I thought. That's why we need to forget about each other and move on." 

"You want to move on?" she asks softly. 

He doesn't answer right away, just looks at her. "I never thought we would come to this. If I had known...." 

"I know," she replies. "I had to go. I couldn't let things stay the way they were. I had to see her, Vaughn." 

"You had to use me to do it?" he asks carefully. "That doesn't seem like a requirement." 

"You were there. I couldn't ... you had the directions. You had them. I needed them." 

"I'm not going to argue with you about this," he says suddenly, pinching the skin between his eyebrows. "We didn't just sleep together, and you know it. We had an _affair_, Sydney, and we almost got caught, and it was your fault. You almost got the both of us killed because of your goddamned curiosity. That's two months of my life that I wasted with you, thinking that you were serious about this when all you wanted was easy access to your _mother_." He says it like a swear word, and she flinches. 

"I don't know how to tell you how sorry I am," she breathes, praying that she won't cry. 

He nods again. "I know." 

The abrupt nurse walks in and drops a clipboard on the bed. "Here are your papers; you'll need to speak with the doctor once more before you leave." She leaves, but not before shooting a questioning glance at Sydney. 

"Thank you," he says tonelessly, reaching for the papers and wincing. Sydney sighs and grabs the clipboard, handing it to him. He doesn't say anything. 

"I'm worried that you might not be okay on your own," she says suddenly, and he looks up. 

"Sydney, I'm really going to be all right." 

"If there's some emergency ... you can't guarantee that you'll be okay by yourself." 

He sighs and drops the clipboard pen onto the forms. "What do you want me to say? My mother isn't here, and I don't have any other family. I don't have a choice. I'll be okay." 

She looks at him, not wanting to say aloud what she's thinking. Instead she just twists her hands and watches him fill out forms, finally murmuring, "What if...?" 

He looks up at her, and his eyes widen. "Oh, no...." 

Her heart starts to pound nervously. "I'm just saying that it's a viable option." 

"That's the most ... _not_ viable option I've heard yet." 

"Seriously, Vaughn, it could help. It could work." 

He takes a deep breath and steeples his fingers, pressing them against his lips. "I could write you a list of a thousand reasons why this wouldn't work." 

"Fine. But you know, I think it would be better for everyone." 

"Not better for me. I'd kill you, I think." 

"You've just been shot in the chest. I think I could take you," she points out, and a faint smile spreads across his face for the briefest moment. She feels a matching smile flicker across her own face, then purses her lips and stares down at her hands. 

"We can barely even stand to be in the same room," he says quietly. "I think we'd both end up worse for the wear. More me than you, probably." 

"I still don't like the idea of you staying alone." She pauses, watching him scribble out his signature. "When does your mom get home?" 

"She'll be back in September," he says absently. "Hopefully I'll be back at work by then." 

"You really don't have any concept of what's happened to you, do you?" 

"What's that supposed to mean?" 

She takes a deep breath. "You almost died. You were _thisclose_ to bleeding to death in the back of my father's car. You aren't just going to get back to normal." She pauses. "There was an agent at SD-6 who was shot a few years ago just about the same way. He didn't come back to work for five months." 

Vaughn shakes his head. "I'm going to say it for the last time; I'm going to be fine on my own." 

She opens her mouth to continue, but the nurse walks in again and takes the charts from Vaughn, handing them to the doctor who has stepped through the doorway. "Well, Michael, looks as though you're going home," the doctor says, and it's a little jarring when Vaughn responds with a nod to his first name. She forgets sometimes that he's a whole other person from the Vaughn she's come to know. 

"Will your girlfriend be staying with you?" the doctor asks placidly, flipping through the forms. 

Vaughn shakes his head again, pursing his lips like he's sure of what's coming next. "No." 

The doctor looks surprised. "The release is conditional on your having twenty-four-hour care at home," he says. "You weren't aware of that." 

"No, I was," Vaughn replies tightly. "There are people I can call twenty-four hours a day." 

"That's not the same," the doctor admonishes, shaking his head, and Vaughn's cheeks turn light red. She suddenly feels uncomfortable watching the conversation. "Your insurance company states that there must be someone else with you at all times. It's a liability precaution in your plan." 

"I'll talk to my insurance company," he says, but the doctor shakes his head again. 

"Is there someone available to stay with you?" the doctor asks calmly. 

She can tell that Vaughn's trying desperately not to look at her. "I don't know." 

"You'll need to make arrangements before I can sign a release form. You can use the phone by the bed to make any calls that you need." The nurse and the doctor both leave as quietly as possible, and Vaughn rubs the wrinkles in his brow. 

"Don't say a word," he mutters, finally looking over at her. 

"I wasn't going to," she defends. 

"You're my only option, and you know it." 

She just nods slowly. 

"Sydney...." 

"If you need me, I'm there. You know that." 

He laughs, sharp and bitter, and shakes his head. "I suppose we'll find out soon enough if I'm stupid for believing you twice." 

The arrangements are made quickly, and the wind whips her hair about her face she loads his bag into the back of the Land Rover while an orderly helps him into the passenger's seat. "I'm going to swing by home and grab a few things," she says quietly, and he nods, rubbing his temples. "You can sit in the car if you don't want to come in." 

"Is your roommate home?" 

She shakes her head. "I don't think so. She shouldn't be." 

He exhales slowly. "This seat isn't exactly comfortable; if I could come in and sit on your couch...." 

"That's fine," she offers, and he does, watching sports coverage of some kind while she throws clothes into a duffel bag. She'll call Francie later, she decides; it'll be easier to explain over the telephone than with a hastily-written note. Pulling the strap of her bag over her shoulder, she calls out to Vaughn, who is awkwardly standing when she walks into the living room. She gives him a quick, compulsory smile and helps him to the car. The wind sweeps her hair around his face, and she watches as he carefully brushes the strands away. 

She feels lighter, as if the rushing wind has blown a few of the many weights from her shoulder. She sneaks a quick glance at him before putting the car into drive and asking for quiet directions to his apartment.   
  
  
Posted: Monday, May 20, 2002   
Next week: **{rain}**


	5. rain

**Title**: "the elements"  
**Chapter**: {rain}  
**Summary**: After an angry separation, Vaughn and Sydney's lives come crashing together again.  
**Category**: Sydney/Vaughn angst  
**Author**: Bella (bella_lumina@yahoo.com)  
**Rating**: R  
**Timeline**: AU, takes place after "The Solution."  
**Thanks**: to Souris for the encouragement, and to the reviewers for their kind words.  
**Disclaimer**: Alias is not mine.   
  
  
**{rain}**

The sky doesn't open up until they've pulled into the garage under his building. The wind has cleared the path; the rain follows through slowly but surely. Trickle -- trickle -- spatter -- mist -- and then the wind comes again, and then the drizzle grows into bigger drops and bigger drops until it's full-blown rain. She has to park close to the garage entrance because it's after rush hour and everyone is home from work, so when they get out of the car the rain filters in silently, the misty residue clinging to them like sweat. She watches as he braces himself against the door as he lowers his feet to the pavement, and a pang of something -- she's not sure what -- hits her. 

His building is extremely nice, which surprises her a little. For some reason she always expected him to live in a modest, small apartment building. But this place is different; he has a doorman and a parking garage and a red awning over the revolving door. She's known him for years, has even been intimate with him, but she knows frustratingly little about the man behind the CIA handler. He punches a code into the garage elevator and they step inside, Sydney carefully pulling his bag behind. He doesn't say anything, and the insistent sound of the rain even breaks through to the silence inside the small space. 

"This is really nice," she comments as the elevator doors slide open. The hallway is gilded; the whole place looks old and expensive. "The Agency must pay you better than they pay me." 

He snorts, leaning on her arm with a rigidity that betrays reluctance and discomfort. "My salary's no better than yours," he says, and he doesn't elaborate. She wants to ask, but she decides not to. 

The hallway feels insulated and a little overbearing. She's almost relieved when he unlocks the door and swings it open, grabbing the frame for support as he walks inside and tosses the keys on the table. Mumbling something, he walks slowly through a doorway and disappears. 

His apartment is sparse but not uninviting. She knows that Alice shared the space with him at one time, and her touch in the décor is obvious. The furniture is neutral and comfortable-looking -- the telltale sign of a woman in the past? It matches -- and the photographs on the wall are uniformly black-and-white in thin black frames. Her eyes slide over the pictures as the rain pounds loudly against the large, uncovered windows that take up nearly an entire wall on the south side of the room. Pictures of Vaughn and his family, pictures of Vaughn and his friends; beaming in a mortar board beside his mother on a graduation day; laughing with Weiss, two men she doesn't recognize, and a woman she assumes to be a former girlfriend. Signs of a normal past. 

She isn't on the wall; she isn't anywhere in his apartment. _Of course you aren't_, she chides herself. But it still stirs something unpleasant inside her to know that she has been a friend of his for years and even his lover for a few months and there isn't any trace of her. There can't be. _But you're here now_, her inner voice hisses. She swallows and turns her attention to the water-streaked windows. 

Vaughn makes his way back into the room and sits heavily on one of the over-stuffed couches, exhaling slowly. "The guest room is clean," he says suddenly, and she turns away from the window to look at him. "You can put your things in there." 

"Thanks," she replies casually, grabbing her bag. "Where...?" 

"Down the hall, second door on the left." 

She nods, picking up her bag and following the described path. An open door on the way reveals his bedroom with its neutral walls, neatly made bed, and pile of sports gear shoved together in one corner. Footsteps behind her send her quickly toward the guest room, and she hurries inside. 

The windows in the room are small and close to the ceiling, but at least they're there; she suddenly feels the urge to stand and watch the rain. She drops her duffel on the floor, kicks off her shoes, and climbs up on the bed, bouncing unsteadily as she gets used to the feel of the mattress under her feet. Her fingers grasp for the sill, and she peeks over the edge, resting her chin against the wood. The rain streaks down the window in sure, steady rivulets. 

"What are you doing?" 

She turns so rapidly that she loses her precarious footing and ends up falling not-so-gracefully on her butt on the bed. He coughs and smirks slightly. 

"I was watching the rain," she explains softly, pointing at the windows. 

He squints his eyes, but then he nods and coughs again. "I just checked the refrigerator, and I don't think I've got anything to eat, so I'm going to run over to the grocery store...." 

"No, you're not," she says sternly, awkwardly maneuvering off the bed and standing. She brushes the hair out of her face and brushes off her jeans. "I'll go ... wait. I guess we'd better both go. Are you feeling up to it?" 

He shrugs. "I can stay here by myself." 

"Ah, no, you can't. Were you not listening at all when the doctor was talking to you?" 

"Sydney, seriously. Like they're going to know." 

"I'll know." 

He sighs. "Are you going to be like this the entire time?" 

"Yes," she says confidently. 

"Because, you know, you never really had a problem with disobeying orders before...." 

She winces. "That's pretty harsh." 

"I don't think it's unwarranted," he says coolly. 

She closes her eyes and shakes her head. "Go take a nap or something. You're cranky. I'll order a pizza. I need to call Francie anyway." 

He just stares at her for a moment, then nods and turns, heading back to his room. She rolls her neck, wincing as the bones crack and pop, then picks up her bag and dumps the contents onto the bed. Five minutes later her clothes are tucked away in the dresser and her shampoo and conditioner are resting next to his in the single bathroom. She ducks into his room before heading to the telephone; he's breathing in time with the falling rain outside. 

She finds a cordless phone in the kitchen and perches on a barstool before dialing her own phone number. Leaning against the countertop in front of her -- a nice, shining granite countertop -- she waits for a familiar voice or a familiar message to speak to her. 

"Hello?" 

It's Will. She swallows around the sudden lump in her throat; while she has said a few words to Francie lately, she hasn't spoken to Will at all since the confrontation in her living room. "Will. It's Sydney." 

A pause. "Can I help you with something?" 

Too stilted. Too formal. It's like he isn't sure how to react to her, but then, she doesn't know how to react to him, either. "Is Francie there?" 

"Hang on." There's a shuffling noise on the other end of the line, then some murmuring. 

"Sydney?" Francie asks. 

"I wanted to let you know that I won't be home for a while," she begins, then winces. Not the wording she had planned. 

"Oh," Francie says flatly. "I guess I'm not supposed to ask why." 

"You can ask why," Sydney replies quietly, propping her head up with her free hand. "My friend that was shot ... I'm staying with him for a while, until he can stay on his own." 

"Okay." 

"Okay, then ... I might drop by now and then to pick things up." 

"Okay." She hears mumbling in the background: Will. She can't make out what he's saying, but it's probably sarcastic, and her cheeks burn when she decides it's probably about her. 

"So, I'll see you later, then." 

"That's fine," Francie replies crisply, and then the line goes dead. 

_I will not cry_, she decides. When she cries, it's an awful, disgusting, embarrassing cry, full-on tears and saliva and snot. She hates crying, and she especially hates crying around other people. It's humiliating; it makes her feel like she's three years old. She thinks that it's funny that she used to not mind bawling in front of Vaughn; now, she cringes at the idea that he might come in and see her sobbing. 

A few deep breaths and a count of ten later, she's rooting through the kitchen drawers, looking for a telephone book. She hits pay-dirt -- the take-out drawer, full of menus from what seems to be every restaurant in the greater Los Angeles area -- and shuffles through the brightly-colored pamphlets until she finds a pizza place that she likes. The woman who answers the phone has a Korean accent, and she chirps excitedly when Sydney gives the order in the woman's native language. 

She yawns as she traipses back to the living room and nearly trips over an ottoman in the process. The couch is inviting, and when she sits, she discovers that it's one of those couches that gives just enough under a person's weight. She kicks off her shoes, grabs the remote from the coffee table, and curls up to watch television. As she's surfing the channels -- all five million of them on his satellite dish -- she's surprised to see him sit down on the other end of the couch. 

He stares straight ahead as she looks over at him. "You were sleeping, weren't you?" 

"For maybe twenty minutes. I slept for three weeks in the hospital," he points out. "I'm not used to sleeping this much." 

"You can consider this a vacation, then, learn how to sleep until noon again." 

"I never could do that," he muses quietly. "I think the Dodgers are playing." 

She gives him a look. "Point being...?" 

"You don't like baseball?" 

"No," she admits. "It takes too long. I'm not that patient." 

"You know, I've noticed that." 

She tosses him the remote and yawns, curling around one of the couch cushions. "Go ahead." She rubs her face against the arm of the couch. "I ordered a pizza." 

He flips to a sports channel. "Yeah?" 

"Uh-huh. I spoke Korean to the take-out woman. She got so excited...." 

He's silent for a moment, focusing on the baseball game. When the pitcher strikes the batter out to end the inning, he asks, "When will it be here?" 

The cushions muffle her voice. "Any minute." 

She's asleep by the time it arrives, and she doesn't wake until the game is long over and the barely-touched pizza box is stuffed in the fridge. He's snoring lightly in one of the big, overstuffed chairs near the couch, his chin almost touching his chest. She stretches and rises stiffly, padding across the rug to gently shake him on the shoulder. 

He awakens slowly, just as she remembers, blinking the sleep from his eyes and squinting up at her. "Come on," she says in a gravelly voice, "it's ten-thirty. You'll hurt for days if you sleep in that chair much longer." 

He nods mutely, gripping the chair arms and wincing slightly as the action puts pressure on his chest. She grabs his right arm before he can sink back into the chair. 

"Careful...." 

He grunts in response, leaning on her as she walks with him to his room. "Need help?" 

"No." He gives her a strange look, and then closes the door of his room behind him. 

She sighs, rolling her neck as she heads back into the living room to turn off the lights and the television. The soles of her bare feet slap against the wooden floor as she walks around the room, reaching under lampshades to silence the glaring bulbs. The rain still persists, but softer now, and she sighs in the darkness before heading to the bathroom to wash her face before bed. 

Four-thirty in the morning, and she's suddenly awake and she doesn't know why. She twists fitfully in the strange bed, the disheveled sheets pulling painfully against her skin as she rolls onto her back. 

"No!" 

She sits up suddenly, the cool blue light of darkness floating through the windows and tracing strange shapes on the floor, the bed, her face. Her t-shirt is damp with perspiration; her hair is sticking to her face. Her heart races as she listens, her ears honed in on the sound of that tortured cry. 

The apartment is silent. The rain has stopped. She listens for fifteen minutes, and then she falls asleep before she can even lie down, her body languidly lowering itself to the mattress. She sleeps until morning, until the sun struggles over the horizon and splashes weak light over her face. The scent of freshly-brewed coffee wafts into the room, and she rubs her eyes, trudging out of bed and into the kitchen. 

He's sitting at the kitchen table, holding a mug in one hand and the international news in the other. She pours herself a cup and sits across from him, studying him until he finally looks up and levels her with his gaze. "What?" 

"Why do you even bother reading that?" 

He frowns, and she elaborates, "You know it's full of watered-down news anyway. The stuff that actually happens never gets reported." 

"The stuff you do?" he asks mildly, taking a long drink. 

She shrugs. "The stuff you do, too." 

"Used to do," he says, wincing as he sets the cup down on the wooden table. "Now this is as close to the news as I'm going to get for a while." 

She decides against saying the typical, "Oh, don't worry, you'll be back at your desk again soon," because she knows it could be months. She also knows that he would see right through her. So she simply intones, "True." 

He clears his throat. "I need to go to the grocery store. We've got cold pizza and coffee and that's pretty much it." 

"Yeah," she agrees softly. "I'm going to take a shower, and then we can go." 

He opens his mouth to protest, but she holds up a hand. "Let's not start ... we've already been through this." 

Silence falls for a moment, and then he nods. "Okay." 

First she has to get over the strange sensation of being in Vaughn's shower (though, she reminds herself, it's not like she's never been in a shower _with_ him before, so why should it be strange to be in his shower by herself? But she knows why), and then she has to deal with the awkwardness that accompanies them when they go to the grocery store. It isn't just because they're in some impossible rut in their relationship that they may never pass, but because they have never been in public together in Los Angeles before the past day. 

She drives to the store, and he does not touch her when he gets out of the car or while they're in the store. He stumbles once, but instead of reaching for her hurriedly outstretched arms, he grabs a shelf, nearly pulling down a stack of canned pears. The blonde woman behind them in the checkout line smiles at Vaughn, and he smiles back. 

On the silent drive home she finally accepts that there probably isn't any hope for them at all. 

He cooks -- she can't -- while she sits in the living room, dwelling on how very pathetic she really is. She has lost the few friends she had, and now she is gambling her emotions on a relationship that she's already exploited and ruined once. What kind of idiot is she, to think that Vaughn would forgive her for what she's done? 

She hurries into the kitchen, where he is deliberately measuring cooking oil into a measuring cup. He looks up, startled, then turns his attention back to his task. "Something the matter?" he asks coolly. 

"I left you," she states, her hands shaking. 

He swallows and puts the bottle on the countertop before looking at her. "Yes," he says, meeting her eyes. "You left me." 

"You woke up, and I wasn't in bed with you anymore." 

"Why are you rehashing this? We both know what happened," he says angrily, crossing his arms over his chest. 

"I didn't plan it." 

He shakes his head, smiling ironically, and leans against the counter. "You didn't, did you?" 

"I didn't." 

"Well, it was awfully convenient, then...." 

"It _was_ convenient. But I didn't plan it. I didn't know that you had found her until we were in Paris." 

"So, what, you got up to get a glass of water, and you tripped over my briefcase, and the directions happened to fall out, and you _happened_ to read them, and you _happened_ to leave?" 

She fidgets. "I shouldn't have brought this up." 

"No, you shouldn't have. But I'm curious now. What kind of excuse are you trying to feed me?" 

"I was in love with you. I'm in love with you." 

"Don't do that. That isn't fair." 

She can see his bare skin glowing in the blue light of the Paris night, the sheets tangled around his slim hips as he sleeps. "I heard you talking to Devlin on the telephone." 

"You were in the shower," he says, staring at her. 

"I wasn't in the shower," she replies, swallowing around the lump in her throat. "I was listening." 

"Why would you do something like that?" he asks with a hint of his former naiveté drenched in absolute anger. 

"I don't know." 

"Sydney ... like _hell_...." He breathes in and out slowly, moving to the table and sitting down. 

She almost hears his raspy breathing as he moves over her, kisses her neck. "Because I could tell you were keeping something from me." 

He glares at her. "You don't get to know everything." 

"Don't you understand how frustrating that could be? You get to know everything -- _everything_ -- about me, and I only had the right to certain pieces...." 

"It was part of the job. It may have been frustrating, but you had to understand that it was part of your job." 

She looks at him, and then turns her face away. "I heard you, and I promised myself that I wasn't going to do anything." 

"Which proves that you have great willpower, Syd." 

_Syd_. Her heart leaps at the nickname. "What would you have done if our roles were reversed? What if you could have made up for lost time with your father." 

His eyes blaze. "What do you think I was doing in the first place?" he asks quietly. "I had my chance to avenge my father. You took that away from me." 

She watches him silently, hearing the echoes of his conversation with Devlin ringing in her ears. "Derevko is confirmed in Paris ... operation launches at three o'clock local time ... no, I'm not going ... I'm staying here. They can handle it without me. No, I won't tell her...." She sees her own hands rifling through his briefcase behind the locked bathroom door while he slept, sees her fingers unlocking the door and disappearing into the night. 

"You weren't even going to go," she says suddenly, pointedly, sitting carefully in a chair opposite him. "Were you too afraid?" 

He raises an eyebrow. "Someone had to keep you occupied," he replies lightly, leveling her with a look that makes her uncomfortable. 

_Occupied_. She folds her arms on the table in front of her. They'd had a lot of sex that night, if that's what he calls keeping her "occupied." "Hm," she says humorlessly, resting her head on her arms. She wants to say, "Well, you certainly did a wonderful job of keeping me away from them, didn't you?" but she doesn't. 

A buzzer goes off in the kitchen, and he stiffly stands to go tend to the food. They eat in silence, and then he states quietly that he's tired, so he's going to bed. She nods, and stays up until after midnight watching infomercials on television. 

At three, she wakes, her pillow pushing her neck into a strange alignment that hurts like hell. She shifts, stretching, and-- 

"No!" 

She sits up. 

"No! God, no...." 

Scrambling out of bed, she nearly takes the covers with her as she runs out the door and into his room. His door is open, and he's thrashing on his bed. Part of his bandage is peeling away, and she hurries to calm him. Somehow she's on his bed, and he's wrapping around her the way he always used to, and she's stroking his slick back and shhhh-ing him softly and pushing away the sweaty sheets. The medical tape refuses to stick to his clammy skin, so she reaches over him to grab a new roll, feeling him rub his face against her hair as she fixes the dressing. 

"There you go ... there you go." 

He mumbles something in response and holds her tighter, and for a moment she's back in all the hotel rooms they shared in Europe, moving under him and over him until neither of them can breathe. His labored breath against her neck pulls her back to reality, and she tries to move away. There's no way they can do this.... 

But he doesn't let her leave his bed or his grasp -- she supposes he's still half-asleep and more than a little groggy -- so she lies carefully beside him and holds him until morning. They're both confused and more than a little embarrassed when they wake, but neither says a word about it. She supposes he's just as unsure of what to say as she. 

Twenty-four hours later, after he shouts into the night again, she's once more sleeping beside him. It happens again the next night, and the next. 

And two weeks pass by, and then a month, and it gets to the point where she doesn't even go to her own room anymore, just crawls into his bed and sleeps next to him. They haven't spoken about Paris or their feelings or their anger since the night in the kitchen, and she's not sure if the subject has died or is simply boiling silently, waiting to bubble over. 

She needs a haircut; she trimmed his for him over the bathroom sink a week before. He calls Weiss to come over and watch the game, and she takes the opportunity to head to the salon. She knows it's going to be a bad day because her regular hairstylist is on maternity leave and a girl with a green streak in her hair is the only stylist available. Sydney agrees, praying that she doesn't end up looking like one of her mission personas, and sits in the chair. The girl chews gum and gabs with the stylist at the next chair while she trims Sydney's split ends. 

"Did you know it's supposed to start raining again this afternoon?" the other stylist, a tall blonde woman, remarks. 

The green-haired girl sighs. "My boyfriend was supposed to take me to the beach later. Guess that's shot." She pauses, carefully measuring Sydney's hair with her fingers. "When Tom convinced me to move here, he said it almost never rained. I'm from Seattle. I can't stand any more rain." 

The blonde woman shrugs. "The weatherman on channel six doesn't get it either, apparently. Hell, I could do that job, as well as they're predicting the future anymore." 

_Weather_, Sydney wants to correct, because she's proof that nobody, not even dead mystics, can predict the future. 

The green-haired girl manages to cut Sydney's hair without hacking strange designs into it, so Sydney pays at the counter, watching ominous dark clouds drift over the horizon and running her fingers through her new, shorter hair. She stops by and picks up some fresh vegetables from her favorite bodega before driving back to Vaughn's; the sky opens up just as she pulls into the parking garage. 

She unlocks the door quietly, and steps into the living room, stopping short when she hears their voices wafting in from the kitchen. "So she isn't leaving yet?" 

"She can't. The insurance company says six weeks, and it's only been four." 

"Maybe she'll stay seven." 

A pause. "She'll leave after six." 

She wants to cry. Weiss's deep voice continues. "You can't really think that she's only here because the insurance company says so." 

"That's exactly why she's here." 

"Mike." 

"Eric," he says with a slightly annoyed tone. "She's staying to help. It's a favor. She's ... I think she's trying to apologize." 

Weiss snorts. "This is a little more than an apology." 

She wonders what Weiss would say if he knew that she and Vaughn were sleeping beside each other at night, that when he woke up shouting and incoherent, they slept with arms wrapped around each other. 

"Listen, whatever you want to think," he replies, and she decides that it's as good a time as any to make her presence known. 

She ducks into the kitchen with her bag of groceries, smiling slightly at both of them. "Hey." 

Vaughn nods, and Weiss replies, "Hi." 

"I bought groceries. It's raining again," she remarks mildly. 

Vaughn's looking at her. "You got your hair cut." 

"That's why I went out," she replies with a quick glance in his direction. 

"No, but I can tell the difference," he amends, watching her expression. "I just usually don't notice those kinds of things." 

"You knew to look for it," she points out. 

He shrugs. "I guess that's true." 

Weiss clears his throat. "I'm going to go. It's my parents' anniversary, and I need to make an appearance." 

Vaughn picks up a glass from the countertop and takes a quick drink. "See you later." 

Weiss nods. "Sydney." 

"Bye," she replies softly, giving him a small smile. Weiss doesn't like her all that much, and she knows this; she always tries to be extra-nice to him, as if it will change things. 

She hears the door close behind Weiss, and she shifts nervously. "I brought vegetables. The bodega had great produce." 

He gives her a weak smile. "Thanks." 

She chops the cherry tomatoes and romaine lettuce she picked up and tosses a salad while he cooks pasta. They eat in relative silence, making quiet comments occasionally, but mostly eating without speaking. She finally speaks while they're washing the dishes. 

"You think I'm doing you a favor?" 

He stops washing a dish for a moment, then continues without looking up. "You're getting a little too familiar with the eavesdropping thing." 

"I didn't mean to. I'd just walked in." 

He nods. "Yeah, I think you're doing this because you feel guilty." He shrugs. "I can't really fault you for that, but it's not necessary." 

"To feel guilty?" she asks incredulously. 

"To try to make up for Paris," he clarifies, putting a dish in the drying rack. 

She nods. "I'm doing this because you needed someone." 

He's silent for a moment. "You're doing this to ease your conscience." 

"You're never going to let this go." 

He puts down the dishrag and turns to her. "I'm not good at forgiving people. I'm very good at keeping grudges." 

She snorts. "That's a little immature." 

"Well, you know, I learned early how to harbor a little ill-will," he says, "even if I wasn't sure who I was angry with." 

She's quiet. "I can't say I'm sorry again. I can't do it." 

"You don't need to." 

"I need to know that you don't hate me." 

His facial expression is carefully schooled. "I don't hate you." 

She gestures vaguely. "I feel pathetic. I feel worthless and pathetic because I did come here to make up for what I did. But that wasn't the only reason ... I came here because I had a stupid idea that you'd be able to forgive me and we'd go back to the way things were before." 

"Sydney, we can't--" 

"I _know_ that," she replies, feeling tears well up in her eyes. "Why do you think I feel so stupid? I look around this place, and I'm not anywhere. You and I were together for months, and I'm not anywhere." She takes a deep breath. "I'll leave as soon as the insurance agent says it's okay." 

He moves to start washing again, but stops. "Sydney, you don't know how much I want to be able to forgive you...." 

"Then _why_ can't you?" she explodes. 

He swallows. "Because I don't know how." He leans against the counter. "My world is completely different from yours. My father won't come back from the dead. I won't ever be able to let go of that." 

"I didn't choose this life." 

"You haven't helped yourself out any," he shoots back. He sighs slowly. "I don't hate you." 

She just nods, hurrying out of the room as she feels tears start to drip down her cheeks. 

He sits in the living room and watches television while she stares out her bedroom window at the pounding rain. Later, he darkens the door of her room. "Aren't you...?" 

She looks at him, feeling something between them that hasn't been there for months. She steps down onto the floor and nods. "Yeah. In a second." 

He's lying on his side, his eyelids drooping sleepily when she crawls under the covers next to him. She buries her face in the pillow and tries to close her eyes. After a few moments she drifts off, but the rain wakes her again after a quarter of an hour. He's still awake, staring at the ceiling. 

"Vaughn...?" 

He turns to look at her. "I don't hate you, but I'll bet you're quite capable of hating me now." 

She shakes her head. "You have every right...." 

He runs his hands through his hair nervously. "I've been cruel to you, and I'm sorry." 

"It's okay--" 

"--it's _not_ okay. That isn't who I am." 

She holds her breath while she waits for his next words, then damns the whole thing to hell when he doesn't speak. Rising carefully, she brushes her lips against his ever so slightly. 

He looks at her, completely caught off-guard, and then he shocks her when he pulls her face to his and kisses her thoroughly. She responds, shifting closer to him and molding his shoulders with her hands. The rain hammers insistently against the windows as she opens her mouth to him, their tongues tangling hotly. 

They pull apart, breath mingling in the small space between them, and explore, re-learning what they've forgotten about each other. Her hands travel all over his body, finally following the trail of dark hair down his abdomen under his boxers to his cock, running her fingers lightly against the shaft. His eyes meet hers, and she curves her hand around him, rubbing the pad of her thumb against the head, feeling a tiny bead of moisture seep out. 

His fingers on her wrist stop her movements, and he pulls away, breathing heavily. 

"I can't -- we can't," he says suddenly, sitting up and trying to catch his breath. "Not like this...." 

She moves away silently and nods, wrapping her arms tightly around herself and hurrying to her own room, calling, "Goodnight," over her shoulder. Her voice cracks, and she manages to shut the door behind her before her sobs escape, mingling with the rain outside her window.   
  
  
Posted: June 27, 2002  
Next installment: **{light}**


	6. light

Chapter six of "the elements," {light}, has been uploaded to my fic site (you can find the link in my profile) as well as Allies.  
  
The text will not be posted here because it's rated NC-17. Thanks for your patience with the story, and I hope you enjoy it!  
  
--Bella 


End file.
